ProShares Ultrashort Financials Fund (Symbol: SKF) Class Action Filed by Bernstein Liebhard LLP

Bernstein Liebhard LLP filed a class action lawsuit on September 25, 2009 in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, on behalf of all persons who purchased or otherwise acquired shares in the UltraShort ProShares Financials fund (the “SKF Fund”), an exchange-traded fund (“ETF”) offered by ProShares Trust (“ProShares”), pursuant or traceable to ProShares’ false and misleading Registration Statement, Prospectuses, and Statements of Additional Information (collectively, the “Registration Statement”) issued in connection with shares of the SKF Fund (the “Class”). The Class is seeking to pursue remedies under Sections 11 and 15 of the Securities Act of 1933 (the “Securities Act”).

The complaint names ProShares, ProShare Advisors LLC, SEI Investments Distribution Co., Michael L. Sapir, Louis M. Mayberg, Russell S. Reynolds, III, Michael Wachs, and Simon D. Collier, as defendants (collectively, “Defendants”). ProShares sells its Ultra and UltraShort ETFs as “simple” directional plays. As marketed by ProShares, Ultra ETFs are designed to go up when markets go up; UltraShort ETFs are designed to go up when markets go down. The SKF Fund is one of ProShares’ UltraShort ETFs. The SKF Fund seeks investment results that correspond to twice the inverse (-200%) daily performance of the Dow Jones U.S Financials Index (“DJFIX”). Accordingly, the SKF Fund is supposed to deliver double the inverse return of the DJFIX, which fell approximately 52.2 percent from January 2, 2008 through December 17, 2008, ostensibly creating a profit for investors who anticipated a decline in the U.S. financials market. In other words, the SKF Fund should have appreciated by over 104 percent during this period. However, the SKF Fund only appreciated approximately 2.2 percent during this period.

The complaint alleges the Defendants violated the Securities Act by failing to disclose the following risks, inter alia, in the Registration Statement: (1) if SKF Fund shares were held for a time period longer than one day, the likelihood of catastrophic losses was huge; and (2) the extent to which performance of the SKF Fund would inevitably diverge from the performance of the DJFIX—i.e., the overwhelming probability, if not certainty, of spectacular divergence.

In addition to filing claims concerning the SKF Fund (NYSE: SKF) and ProShares Ultrashort Real Estate Proshares Fund (NYSE: SRS), Bernstein Liebhard LLP is also investigating claims on behalf of investors in Proshares leveraged funds (the “Funds”) (see list below).

Plaintiff in the SKF Action seeks to recover damages on behalf of all Class members who purchased or otherwise acquired shares of ProShares SKF.  If you purchased or otherwise acquired ProShare SKF shares, and either lost money on the transaction or still hold shares, you may want to join the action to serve as lead plaintiff, to do so you must meet certain requirements set forth in the applicable law and file appropriate papers no later than October 20, 2009.

The current deadline to move in lead plaintiff in ProShares are as follows:

SKF Fund-10/5/09SKF Fund-10/20/09MSC Fund-11/05/09DUG, UYG, SDS, EEV, FXP, SCO Funds 11/23/09

A “lead plaintiff” is a representative party that acts on behalf of other class members in directing the litigation. In order to be appointed lead plaintiff, the court must determine that the class member’s claim is typical of the claims of other class members, and that the class member will adequately represent the class. Under certain circumstances, one or more class members may together serve as lead plaintiff. Your ability to share in any recovery is not, however, affected by the decision whether or not to serve as a lead plaintiff. You may retain Bernstein Liebhard LLP, or other counsel of your choice, to serve as your counsel in this action.

If you purchased or otherwise acquired shares in any of the Funds listed above, and either lost money on the transaction or still hold the shares, please call our office to discuss your rights.

If you would like to discuss the SKF or SRS Actions, claims concerning the Funds, or if you have any questions concerning this Notice, please contact Christian Siebott or Joseph R. Seidman, Jr. at (877) 779-1414.

Bernstein Liebhard LLP has pursued hundreds of securities and consumer cases and recovered approximately $2 billion for its clients. It has been named to The National Law Journal’s “Plaintiffs’ Hot List” in each of the last six years.

You can view a copy of the SKF complaint here, and a copy of the SRS complaint here.